Dreaming In Black & White

[patrick jane]

Do you dream in color or in black & white?

Childhood exposure to black-and-white television seems to be the common denominator. A study published this year, for example, found that people 25 and younger say they almost never dream in black and white. But people over 55 who grew up with little access to color television reported dreaming in black and white about a quarter of the time. Over all, 12 percent of people dream entirely in black and white.
Go back a half-century, and television’s impact on our closed-eye experiences becomes even clearer. In the 1940s, studies showed that three-quarters of Americans, including college students, reported “rarely” or “never” seeing any color in their dreams. Now, those numbers are reversed.

 

[Nick M]

I remember reading and being told that information, and realizing early on how wrong some people are. I just didn't know why. Some times their analytical abilities are very poor. Other times, it is political. I think this one is just poor analytics.

 

[ok doser]

i rarely remember my dreams and don't have any impression as to whether they're in color or not :idunno:


one of the reasons i really really liked the valium i was taking last summer - it made my dreams more vivid and allowed me to remember them

 

[ok doser]

Spoiler

:darwinsm:

 

[annabenedetti]

Do you dream in color or in black & white?

Childhood exposure to black-and-white television seems to be the common denominator. A study published this year, for example, found that people 25 and younger say they almost never dream in black and white. But people over 55 who grew up with little access to color television reported dreaming in black and white about a quarter of the time. Over all, 12 percent of people dream entirely in black and white.
Go back a half-century, and television’s impact on our closed-eye experiences becomes even clearer. In the 1940s, studies showed that three-quarters of Americans, including college students, reported “rarely” or “never” seeing any color in their dreams. Now, those numbers are reversed.

Hi patrick, this is an interesting subject. I looked at the study, and the results section had this to say:

Without a REM awakening study that would probe the colour of people’s dreams more immediately than a dream diary it seems impossible to decide between the two explanations.

I think dream diaries and questionnaires are certainly helpful, but they're at the mercy of individuals' varying abilities not only to recall their dreams, but to accurately recall the details. This study didn't do REM awakening to get the best chance at recall, and the study also suggests that the less likely someone can recall the details of their dreams, the less they can remember color detail, and so are those two things correlated:

On the other hand, poor memory for visual details of a dream might have prevented people from labelling a dream as a coloured one. In this design, the participant needed to remember at least a single occurrence of colour in addition to having a general feeling that the whole dream was in colour for the dream to be classified as coloured. Thus, poor visual recall would influence the dream’s classification, pushing it into ‘inconsistent’ or ‘unrecalled’ category.

Dreams help us to encode memories and to process our sensory experiences, committing some to long term memory and tossing out others. It's very complicated, and this one small study doesn't seem particularly conclusive that there's a significant correlation with exposure to black and white vs. colored media, since we all (with normal vision) experience a multi-colored material world. In looking at the results comparisons between the older and younger group, I can't help but wonder if it's not more an age-related memory difference.

I dream frequently, and I recall a lot of what I dream, I think for a couple of reasons: possibly waking more often right at the end of a REM cycle, and if it's a really incredible/crazy/scary/disturbing/significant dream, I write it down. I've kept a dream diary off and on for years now, and in my case, they often have to do with things I've been worried about when I'm awake, or the things I see and/or experience during the day being kind of put into a new kaleidoscopic pattern. And then a lot of the time, I have no idea where they came from but they'd make a great screenplay. I don't believe dreams are in any way prophetic. It only seems that way sometimes. Anyway, I dream far more often in color than in black and white.

 

[ok doser]

 

[Derf]

Do you dream in color or in black & white?

Childhood exposure to black-and-white television seems to be the common denominator. A study published this year, for example, found that people 25 and younger say they almost never dream in black and white. But people over 55 who grew up with little access to color television reported dreaming in black and white about a quarter of the time. Over all, 12 percent of people dream entirely in black and white.
Go back a half-century, and television’s impact on our closed-eye experiences becomes even clearer. In the 1940s, studies showed that three-quarters of Americans, including college students, reported “rarely” or “never” seeing any color in their dreams. Now, those numbers are reversed.

I don't remember dreams too often, but I do seem to have had quite a few anxiety dreams. Like forgetting to go to class, or being in class naked, when I was in school. They faded over time, until my son went to college. Then I started having them again. The same kinds, too.

And just last night I dreamt about not making a flight in time.

So it seems my dreams are stress related. I remember thinking a particular dream was in color, which solidified in my mind that I dream in color, at least some times. I'm over 50, and we had a bw TV when I was really little, and got color around 7yo.

Sent from my Z992 using TheologyOnline mobile app

 

[patrick jane]

I don't remember dreams too often, but I do seem to have had quite a few anxiety dreams. Like forgetting to go to class, or being in class naked, when I was in school. They faded over time, until my son went to college. Then I started having them again. The same kinds, too.

And just last night I dreamt about not making a flight in time.

So it seems my dreams are stress related. I remember thinking a particular dream was in color, which solidified in my mind that I dream in color, at least some times. I'm over 50, and we had a bw TV when I was really little, and got color around 7yo.

Sent from my Z992 using TheologyOnline mobile app

I keep having dreams that I'm working jobs that I can't really do. I always forget to clock in and wonder if I'm going to get paid. I also have dreams about fighting and defending myself; I always win and sometimes I kill the other guy then worry about the body :rotfl:

 

[intojoy]

I don't remember dreams too often, but I do seem to have had quite a few anxiety dreams. Like forgetting to go to class, or being in class naked, when I was in school. They faded over time, until my son went to college. Then I started having them again. The same kinds, too.

And just last night I dreamt about not making a flight in time.

So it seems my dreams are stress related. I remember thinking a particular dream was in color, which solidified in my mind that I dream in color, at least some times. I'm over 50, and we had a bw TV when I was really little, and got color around 7yo.

Sent from my Z992 using TheologyOnline mobile app

Nice


Sent from my iPhone using TOL

 

[Derf]

I keep having dreams that I'm working jobs that I can't really do. I always forget to clock in and wonder if I'm going to get paid. I also have dreams about fighting and defending myself; I always win and sometimes I kill the other guy then worry about the body :rotfl:

Yes, I do remember fighting dreams, though I always felt like I was trying to punch in a viscous fluid, like under water, and running dreams where I felt I was running in molasses or some such.

Those were always so frustrating, as I was so sure I could run or throw a punch better than that.

Sent from my Z992 using TheologyOnline mobile app

 

[patrick jane]

Yes, I do remember fighting dreams, though I always felt like I was trying to punch in a viscous fluid, like under water, and running dreams where I felt I was running in molasses or some such.

Those were always so frustrating, as I was so sure I could run or throw a punch better than that.

Sent from my Z992 using TheologyOnline mobile app

My fighting dreams used to be losing and not being able to throw a punch, always scared and fearful. I also could not run and sometimes I dragged myself along the ground and felt really weak and fatigued, About a year ago I started winning the fights and taking no bull from anybody; no fear. Also, now I can float in my dreams and I land softly in slow motion if I fall from a great height !! I enjoy my dreams now and I can sometimes control them. Now I work jobs and don't really know what I'm doing but it's like I can't get fired and if I do I come back to work anyway.

 

[Derf]

My fighting dreams used to be losing and not being able to throw a punch, always scared and fearful. I also could not run and sometimes I dragged myself along the ground and felt really weak and fatigued, About a year ago I started winning the fights and taking no bull from anybody; no fear. Also, now I can float in my dreams and I land softly in slow motion if I fall from a great height !! I enjoy my dreams now and I can sometimes control them. Now I work jobs and don't really know what I'm doing but it's like I can't get fired and if I do I come back to work anyway.

What made the difference?

Sent from my Z992 using TheologyOnline mobile app

 

[patrick jane]

What made the difference?

Sent from my Z992 using TheologyOnline mobile app

I'm not sure exactly, but I made a conscious effort to change my dreams. I realized that I can change my dreams and be in control and it started happening. I can't control my dreams but certain aspects improved. I thank God

 

[Derf]

I'm not sure exactly, but I made a conscious effort to change my dreams. I realized that I can change my dreams and be in control and it started happening. I can't control my dreams but certain aspects improved. I thank God

I've had a few dreams where I realized I was dreaming and controlled it some right before I woke up, but they're rare. And I've had some where I wanted to dream a particular thing,and it happened, but even rarer.

Besides the anxiety dreams, I also dream I bought a house, and it has hidden rooms and unexpected treasures the previous owners left behind. Those are fun.

Sent from my Z992 using TheologyOnline mobile app

 

[annabenedetti]

I'm not sure exactly, but I made a conscious effort to change my dreams. I realized that I can change my dreams and be in control and it started happening. I can't control my dreams but certain aspects improved. I thank God

I've never tried to control my dreams, but I've had an awareness that I was dreaming - although can't say for sure whether I was completely asleep or was actually partly awake. I know there have been times right before I've woken up that I've dreamed I was trying, trying to open my eyes or to scream and nothing was happening and I couldn't no matter how hard I tried. I think that those times I might still be sleep paralyzed even though I've begun the process of waking up. (Our muscles are paralyzed during REM sleep to keep us from acting out our dreams. Good thing, too, considering some of the dreams I've had...)

 

[Spitfire]

I've always dreamed in color and vivid colors usually make it a lot easier for me to remember the part of a dream where I saw them.

I dreamed last night that I was looking in a mirror and I saw that my teeth and gums were bleeding, then I realized the gum tissue of my upper jaw had what looked like a film of pale purplish white dead flesh over it. I was easily able to peel it off to reveal a raw, bloody dark purplish mess beneath while I wondered to myself how it could have come to this despite my dedicated efforts at oral hygiene.

No spiders this time at least.

 

[Ask Mr. Religion]

I dream in color, too. Sometimes in my dreams I am dreaming. Dreams within dreams.

AMR

 

[Derf]

I've never tried to control my dreams, but I've had an awareness that I was dreaming - although can't say for sure whether I was completely asleep or was actually partly awake. I know there have been times right before I've woken up that I've dreamed I was trying, trying to open my eyes or to scream and nothing was happening and I couldn't no matter how hard I tried. I think that those times I might still be sleep paralyzed even though I've begun the process of waking up. (Our muscles are paralyzed during REM sleep to keep us from acting out our dreams. Good thing, too, considering some of the dreams I've had...)

I wonder if the sleep paralysis is to blame for the feeling that you can't scream, in your example, or can't run or fight, in mine, even though those things were supposedly in the dream rather than real.

Sent from my Z992 using TheologyOnline mobile app

 

[patrick jane]

I wonder if the sleep paralysis is to blame for the feeling that you can't scream, in your example, or can't run or fight, in mine, even though those things were supposedly in the dream rather than real.

Sent from my Z992 using TheologyOnline mobile app

Yes, that seems likely, it crossed my mind when I read it

 

[ElectricDreams]

I think dreaming in colour depends on a variety of things. I've discussed this at length many a time with people I read dreams for, and I would say that the t.v thing could definately be a factor.
I find that elderly people who are still sharp minded will recall colours from their dreams if they watch alot of t.v these days, while the ones who hardly watch t.v dont recall colour. But I must add in the factor of memory sharpness in general when talking about pre-colour t.v individuals too, as dreams fade from memory bit by bit every second we are awake (in general), and alot of aged people aint as sharp as they were, so remembering the details (people, places, feelings etc)is more important than colours when making sense of dream recall. So they could be dreaming in colour but just not recalling it really. I guess the same could be said of anyone who claims to dream in black and white.
I myself dream in colour alot of the time, but find that when Im struggling to recall a dream, usually if Ive been distracted upon waking, then I dont recall colour, so the memory thing is definately part of the equation there?
I also find that people who play alot of video games recall dreams in much more detail too, and those with very vivid imaginations nearly always report colour.

Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk